Card Range To Study

37 Cards in this Set

The process by which we organize and interpret sensory information in order to recognize meaningful objects and
events is called

perception

The effect of prior experience and current expectations on perception best illustrates the importance of

Top-down processing

Psychophysics is best defined as the study of relationships between

absolute thresholds and difference thresholds

The absolute threshold is the minimum amount of stimulation that a person needs to detect a stimulus

50% of the time

Which of the following strategies best illustrates the use of subliminal stimulation?

A trim female figure is imperceptibly flashed on the TV screen during an ad for a weight-reduction clinic.

Subliminal priming effects best illustrate

that information can be processed outside of conscious awareness.

Those who believe in the value of subliminal audiotapes would be wrong to claim that

unconsciously processed information is unusually persuasive.

If the just-noticeable difference for a 10ounce weight is 1 ounce, the just noticeable difference for an 80-ounce weight
would be ________ ounce(s).

8

If we could stop our eyes from quivering as we stared at a stationary object, the object would probably

vanish from sight.

The area of the retina where the optic nerve leaves the eye is called the

blind spot

The nerve cells that respond to specific aspects of a visual stimulus, such as its shape or its movement, are

feature detectors

Certain stroke victims report seeing nothing when shown a series of sticks, yet they are able to correctly report whether
the sticks are vertical or horizontal. This best illustrates

blindsight

When most people stare at a red square and then shift their eyes to a white surface, the afterimage of the square is

green

. The auditory cortex is most responsive to visual input among those who

have been deaf from birth

With her eyes closed, Sierra can accurately touch her mouth, nose, and chin with her index finger. Sierra's accuracy
illustrates the importance of

kinesthesis.

. Phantom limb sensations best illustrate that pain can be experienced in the absence of

sensory input.

Experimenters bent a finger slightly backward on the unseen hands of 16 volunteers, while simultaneously severely
bending a finger on a visible fake rubber hand. This experiment illustrated the impact of ________ on the volunteers'
experience of pain

phantom limb sensations

People with persistent arm pain experienced a reduction in pain after receiving acupuncture with trick needles that
retracted without puncturing the skin. The fake acupuncture treatment could best be described as a

placebo

Research indicates that we have a receptor for a seeming fifth taste sensation, the meaty taste of

umami

Gestalt psychologists emphasized that

we organize sensory information into meaningful forms.

The Gestalt principles of proximity and similarity refer to ways in which we

organize stimuli into coherent groups.

Infants are especially likely to avoid crawling over the edge of a visual cliff if they

have a lot of previous crawling experience.

A 3D movie enhances our sense of depth perception by simulating the effects of

retinal disparity.

The convergence of parallel lines provides the distance cue known as

linear perspective.

If two identical objects are equally distant from a viewer, the brighter object appears to be

closer.

The perception that Bugs Bunny is hopping across a movie screen best illustrates

stroboscopic movement

Perceiving objects as having consistent shape, size, and color regardless of the angle, distance, and lighting conditions
from which we view them is known as

perceptual set.

The Moon just above the horizon typically appears to be unusually

large because we perceive it as unusually close to ourselves

The Ames illusion involving two girls who are perceived as very different in size can best be explained in terms of

the misperception of distance.

In one experiment, preschool children judged french fries as tasting better when served in a McDonald's bag rather than
a plain white bag. This best illustrates the impact of

perceptual set

Schemas are best described as

concepts that organize sensory input.

An integrated understanding of perception in terms of our sensory capacities, cultural contexts, and Gestalt principles is
most clearly provided by

a biopsychosocial approach

Psychologists who help design machines so that they make use of our natural perceptions are called

human factors psychologists

The study of phenomena such as clairvoyance and telepathy is called

parapsychology.

Shauna claims that she knows at any given moment exactly what important political figures are thinking. Shauna is
claiming to possess the power of

telepathy.

Scientific analyses of the predictive powers of dreams offer support for the existence of